


And They Were Floormates

by TheSilentOtaku



Series: The Tenants of Shining Mansion [1]
Category: Uta no Prince-sama
Genre: Alternate Universe, Cats, Gen, Modern Setting, Sort Of, and they were ROOMMATES, slight crack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-24 01:09:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17091233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSilentOtaku/pseuds/TheSilentOtaku
Summary: Ai has moved into a new apartment with a an assortment of strange and fun people. His new floormate is the strangest and the most fun of them all.A few snippets of my Utapri YouTuber AU from the perspective of Ai.//Utapri Secret Santa 2018





	And They Were Floormates

**Author's Note:**

> This is a gift for @Hydropales on Twitter for the 2018 Utapri Secret Santa!
> 
> I hope you guys like it!

Ai had moved into Shining Mansion about a month after the landlord, Saotome, posted a listing for an empty unit online. The Shining Mansion was one of those new trendy shared housing complexes. There had been an article written about them (in both Japanese and English) in The Japan Times about and how they embodied the changing nature of Japanese social living and how it had opened the market for more people to invest in real estate. Every resident in Shining Mansion had their own room and shared a kitchen and a large bathroom. There were hardwood floors and enough windows to let in natural light during the day. However, no matter how glamorous news articles and TV programming tried to make them, living in one of these buildings was still felt like the adult equivalent of living in a college dorm. But to Ai it was perfect. 

Saotome had made it his personal mission to scout tenants that focused on cultivating an online career of some sort. Ai had met the other residents his first night living in the home. Ren, a friend Ai had met through online gaming, posted daily vlogs along with his friend, Masato. Masato posted piano covers on YouTube. Syo and Natsuki were two childhood friends who shared the only double room in the house. Natsuki made weekly vlogs about visiting restaurants and cafés mostly in the Tokyo area, and Syo had developed a following as a beauty and fashion blogger. Saotome’s two college-aged sons, Otoya and Cecil, lived in the two units on the ground floor and made comedy skits whenever they had free time from school.

There was one other resident he had yet to meet. His floor mate, Ranmaru. Both of them had rooms on the third floor of the house; however, Ai hadn’t seen him since he’d moved in. No one in the building spoke to Ranmaru often, but they all seemed to like him well enough.

“Ran-chan looks scary, but he’s actually really nice!” Natsuki told him one evening when he was preparing to film a new video in the kitchen. He’d tied his pink apron decorated with white lace around his waist and pulled mixing bowls from the cabinets while Syo set up the tripod and camera on the other side of the kitchen island. “When he gets home from work he always has all of these really nice sweets and pastries!”

“Where does he work?” Ai asked.

“I don’t know…” Natsuki trailed off in thought while looking down at the recipe in front of him. “But the food is really good…”

Apparently, no one in the house knew where Ranmaru worked. All they knew was that the man took naps on the couch in the living room, posted band covers of his favorite songs on YouTube, and came home late every weekday night with a bag full of pastries.

The house was filled with nice people with strange hobbies, but Ai felt that he would fit in just fine.

* * *

 

 

Ai officially meets Ranmaru on one of his days off from work. Boxes of his new streaming equipment had been delivered and he was struggling with carrying the boxes up the stairs to his room. When he reached the top platform, he saw who he expected to be his illusive floor mate holding his very expensive— and now very destroyed— Razor gaming headset.

Kurosaki Ranmaru was a severe-looking man with mismatched eyes and wild hair. With his appearance, Ai suspected that any older person would mark him as the anti-establishment, down-with-the system, I-do-whatever-the-fuck-I-want young person that deliberately went against conforming methods of self-expression just for the hell of it. His intimidating image, however, was ruined by the uncomfortable and troubled look on his face when he turned to face Ai from where he was standing by Ai’s open room door.

“It was an accident,” Ranmaru said as he tightened his grip on the broken headphones. “I stepped on… them…”

Ai tried not to show how disappointed he was, but he couldn’t help the annoyed sigh he let out. Those headphones had cost him a lot of money, even with his employee discount. Now he’d have to save to buy new ones. 

“I would really hate it if my neighbor had decided to snap my headphones on purpose,” Ai’s eyes narrowed as he looked at the crushed left speaker. He set down the box he was holding and held out his hand. “Give them here. It’s fine.”

When Ranmaru held out the headphone, Ai snatched them up and threw them in the box he had been holding. He picked the box up  and brushed passed Ranmaru to get to his own room. Before he disappeared into his room, Ai noticed that Ran had white strands of something clinging to his jeans. 

Were those… animal hairs? He thought about it, but didn’t say anything. And about an hour later when he was setting up his gaming PC, Ai forgot all about it.

What really sucked about his broken headphones was the he didn’t have a backup pair and had to listen to sound through his computer speakers. Which was fine, but it was hard to hear notifications and slight changes in music when he didn’t have sound blasting in his ears from high quality speakers. So, there he was, in the middle of the night, filming and trying get to a checkpoint in  _ Wanderer of the North _ when he heard someone pounding on his door right when he was about to reach the cave of the middle level boss. He paused his game and padded to his door to open it.

He was met with a rumpled-looking, angry Ranmaru dressed in a baggy t-shirt and sleep pants decorated with… cartoon… cats? That wasn’t what he expected from someone so mean-looking. Ai eyes tried to focus on the different drawings of cats to see if he recognized them from a show he’d been watching. Then he tried to focus on Ranmaru face. Both looked blurry to him because he had been playing his game for hours, in the dark, without wearing his computer glasses and the hallway lights had been turned off.

“Do you have any idea what time it is?” Ranmaru asked. To Ai, it was very obvious that Ranmaru was trying to develop a glare through the fog of sleep.

Ai reached into the pocket of of his shorts and pulled out his phone. He checked the time. “It’s 2:10 in the morning.” He said it with less self-awareness than he intended. When he looked back up at Ranmaru, he looked furious.

“So why did you think it was a good idea to make so much damn noise at 2 in the morning when people are trying to sleep?”

“Well…” Ai thought it was obvious. “...you broke my headphones so…” He didn’t know the walls here were so thin. He’d have to look into whether it was okay to soundproof his room.

Ranmaru looked like he wanted to argue, but the exhaustion must have overtaken him. He sighed as he rubbed a hand over his face and pinched the bridge of his nose. 

“Wait here,” Was all he said before he disappeared back into his room for a minute and returned with a set of black headphones. “Here.” He shoved them into Ai’s chest who took them and inspected them.

“These are really nice quality.” Ai was reminded of Ranmaru’s hobby and his videos. Of course he’d have good equipment.

“Do you want them or not?” Ranmaru growled out. His messy hair and baggy clothes made him look soft and sleepy despite his best efforts to look angry. “Actually, don't answer that. Just take them. Keep them. I don't care. I have work tomorrow.”

“I work too.” Ai called after him as Ranmaru stomped back to his room and shut the door.

* * *

 

Ai worked in a  _ Loft  _ department store in Shibuya on the tech and accessories floor. He got off at 9 in the evening and usually looked for a small café or family restaurant to eat at before he caught a train back home.

Today, he was interested in going to a cat café that a co-worker had made the off comment about in passing conversation. It was called the Cat-a-Lounge. When Ai had looked the place up on his phone, he found that the business was owned by an old woman and was partnered with a local shelter to help cats find loving homes. The café was a 20-minute walk from the department store and didn't close until 11. Mind made up, he typed the address into his phone’s GPS and walked all the way there.

The Cat-a-Lounge was nestled in a white brick building, a floor above a small family-owned bookstore. Ai walked up the side of the building via it’s black wrought iron stairs to a purple door decorated with crocheted doilies shaped like cats and a gold door knocker. The name of the cafe was painted on a wooden slab hanging from the door in white cursive lettering.

Ai knocked. The door opened, and a worker greeted him.

“Welcome to the Cat-a-Lounge. Please make sure to—“

The voice was too familiar; deep and rough around the edges. Ai let his eyes travel up the worker’s body. Dark pants littered with cat hairs, a deep purple apron with the name of cafe stitched into it. On the chest of the apron, can buttons decorated with cat puns and drawings and candid photos of cats. Ai’s eyes glanced over one that read “Purr-bread” that had a picture of a cat with his head smashed through a slice of bread before he met the eyes of the worker…

…the mismatched and surprised eyes of Ranmaru himself.

Well, this was interesting.

* * *

 

“Here’s your cake. Please make sure not to feed it to any of the cats. We’re trying to manage their weights.” Ranmaru recited as he placed Ai’s order in front of him.

Yuuna, the jet black cat currently in his lap, reached out a paw to swipe at his cake, but Ai moved it out of her reach. She meowed in protest and Ai scratched under her chin as an apology before letting her hop off of his lap to find some other sorry customer to steal food from.

Ai had been visiting the Cat-a-Lounge every weekday after work for a little over a month. He had introduced himself to the owner, Keiko, as Ranmaru’s housemate, which she interpreted as the two of them being friends. Ai found it more funny than anything else, and it pleased him even more to see Ranmaru’s eyes squint and his nose scrunch whenever he walked through the cafe’s door. Ai found that he quite liked irritating Ranmaru whenever he could. The man would get angry, but Ai had seen him in his pajamas and even caught him baby talking one of the cats when he thought no one was looking. His tough-guy image had absolutely no effect on him anymore.

“Don’t you think you should smile?” Ai asked his disgruntled waiter slash housemate before the man could make a break for it back to the kitchen. 

“Not if you’re going to make fun of me for it again.”

“That’s really bad customer service. Keiko-san!” Ai called out. He didn’t need to shout as the owner was nearby massaging the ears of Mochi, the oldest and fattest cat that lived in the cafe. “I caught Ranmaru not smiling again! He’s also being  _ particularly _ grumpy this evening.” 

Keiko turned from Mochi. “Ran-chan, how many times do I have to tell you to be nice to the customers.”

“I’m nice enough to the ones that don’t annoy me.”

“But we’re  _ friends _ .” Ai tried his best to whine in the most annoying voice he could.

Gizmo, a gray mixed breed who had just been given the okay to be transferred to the cafe from the animal shelter, hopped down from the fake tree climbing tree in the middle of the cafe. He slinked over to Ai and pawed at his leg until Ai gave his head a good scratch. The cats took a liking to him. Ranmaru mentioned that it’s probably because he sat very still and spoke softly. “They probably think you’re a new climbing toy.”

Diana was perched on the windowsill above him. She was an all white Persian with one green right eye and a blue left eye. Keiko had told him that she was deaf in her left ear and wasn’t as sociable as the other cats. She was having a hard time getting adopted. Ai patted his knee and cooed for her to come down. She inspected him from where she was, but didn’t move. One day Ai would get her to warm up to him.

Speaking of warming up to him…

“Ranmaru, take a picture with me so I can send it to Ren. He wants to see your uniform.”

“Over my dead body.”

“Ran-chan! Manners!” Keiko scolded.

Ai allowed himself to snort lightly. He snapped a quick photo of Ranmaru retreating to the kitchen and sent it off to the Shining Mansion group chat on Line. A minute later he received a string of stickers from Natsuki and a text about how cute Ranmaru looked. Masato sent a picture of a cat backing up with a empty ice cream container on its head with the accompanied text “same energy.”

He would seize an opportunity for a better photo when Ranmaru least expected it.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I actually really struggled with this because I never really write for Utapri even though I love it so much. I hope I did a good job. 
> 
> I'm a diehard Ai oshi, but writing from his perspective is damn hard and I don't think I'll be doing it again any time soon. Ai sweetie I love you but I just-- no.
> 
> Anyways, you can find me on [@blackrabbit-megapig](http://blackrabbit-megapig.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr, but I'm much more active on Twitter [@kurousagi_ojou](https://twitter.com/kurousagi_ojou)


End file.
